1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an information recording apparatus, and an information recording and reproducing apparatus, which can record a television broadcast etc., and is represented by a home video tape recorder (hereinbelow, it is simply referred to as a VTR), and more particularly to an information recording apparatus and an information recording and reproducing apparatus, which is capable of a so-called reserved recording operation i.e., which can set a scheduled time to start recording and a schedule time to stop recording beforehand in accordance with a future broadcast schedule and can automatically start and stop recording the television broadcast etc. The present invention also relates to a record medium on which such a reserved recording operation can be performed.
2. Description of the Related Art
When an information recording apparatus, which is capable of performing a reserved recording operation among the above mentioned information recording apparatuses such as the home VTR and the like, performs the reserved recording operation for a television broadcast etc., the reservation information including the scheduled time to start recording (including the date), the scheduled time to stop recording, the television channel to be used and so on are firstly stored in a memory in the information recording apparatus. Then, a video tape etc., onto which the television broadcast is to be recorded is loaded or inserted into the information recording apparatus, and the timer is set.
By this kind of operation, it is automatically started to record the television broadcast etc., onto the record medium, when it comes the above mentioned time to start recording.
On the other hand, the above mentioned reservation information may further include, other than the above, (i) information indicating the broadcasting day of the week in case of recording a series program such as a television series drama which is weekly broadcasted, and (ii) information indicating the fact that the program is daily broadcasted in case of recording the program which is daily broadcasted every day at the same time.
However, according to the above mentioned information recording apparatus, in case of performing the reserved recording operation, it is necessary to insert the record medium, onto which the television broadcast etc., is to be recorded, into the information recording apparatus when the television broadcast etc., to be recorded is started. Hence, it is a troublesome job to insert the record medium at the appropriate time, and if the record medium is not inserted at that time, the television broadcast etc., cannot be recorded, resulting in that the continuity of the television broadcast etc., to be recorded onto the record medium is lost, which is one problem.
Further, after one operation of recording the television broadcast etc., is finished, if the record medium is left as it is, another operation of recording the television broadcast etc., may be performed on the basis of another reservation information, resulting in that the continuity of the television broadcast etc., may be lost, and that the convenience is drastically degraded, which is another problem.